Blast Furnace
The Blast Furnace is the last boss you'll fight before killing Blackhand, the leader of Blackrock Foundry. Furnace is one of the hardest, most complicated, and easiest places to die in the entire instance. Parties must be experienced, durable, and understand the mechanics of this fight if they hope to succeed. A party of newbs should not attempt Furnace and expect to win on their first or fourth try. To begin, the raid leaders must split the party into a left and right side. Each side will be responsible for closing the hatches on their side of the room, and maintain threat on all the NPCs on their side. Right side should take the mini boss "Feldspur" and thus the right side is considered the more difficult side. Raid leaders should stack their strongest players (dps) on the right side and instruct them to murder Feldspur immediately. All players should be buffed to high heaven, have various defensive tools at their disposal, and understand what their responsibilities are for each phase of the battle. No players can die on Phase1 or Phase2, or the boss will be too difficult to down and lava will overtake the remaining party members. Furnace is a long fight, so your CDs will have time to replenish. Sometimes you can even get two Heroisms off during a fight, but I don't recommend it. Phase1: Close the Hatches In Phase1 the party's job is to use bombs to close the hatches located on the sides of the Furnace. The hatches are marked by bullseyes and are damaged by dropping bombs (using your "Extra Action Button") on the hatch. Bombs are gained by killing Engineers who will drop a bomb bag. A durable player will take the bombs from the bag and use bombs on the hatches until the hatches close. Be sure to use a defensive CD when detonating a bomb and remember that bombs deal damage to nearby party members. Phase1 has a kill order for the NPCs: Big Ogres > Security Guards > Engineers. On the right side they must contend with Feldspur, the Furnace's mini boss. He will cast an ability called "Rupture" which is a countdown to lava death! The targeted player must notice they have Rupture and run to the edges of the room and let the Rupture expire. This will drop a lava circle under their feet. Failing to position the Rupture away from the party can cause death and impossible positioning. It is for this reason that on the right side of the room, Feldspur is the #1 kill target. Right side must down Feldspur as fast as possible (don't use Heroism / Bloodlust) while simultaneously downing the Big Ogres and Engineers. Tanks, be careful with the Security Guards. Guards will drop a purple shield zone that will prevent all damage within that zone. Your job is to position the NPCs such that they are not in that shield zone. DPS remember your kill order in Phase1: Big Ogres > Security Guards > Engineers! The Big Ogres help increase party wide damage. As they pull their chain, the heat bar will increase. The higher the heat bar is, the more damage the Furnace will hit the party with at regular intervals. Killing the Big Ogres prevents the heat bar from increasing and makes life easier on the healers. When both hatches are bombed into closing, Phase1 ends and the Furnace begins overheating. Phase2: Kill the Elementalists With the hatches closed, the Furnace will overheat and release the trapped boss. Fire will spawn in the middle, along with four Elementalists who are channeling a containment spell on the elemental. Your job in Phase2 is to kill the Elementalists and free the boss from the containment. The four elementalists are immune to damage. To remove this buff, the tanks in your party must pull the "Slag Elementals" (rocks or rock elementals) near the elementalists and kill the rocks. The rocks will explode and disable the damage immunity buff on the elementalists. Once Phase2 begins, the party should center themselves on one elementalist and begin focusing it down using the rocks to remove the damage immunity buff. Due to rocks being the only way to beat Phase2, the DPS should avoid killing rocks at all costs. Area Damage should be avoided and single target dps is how victory is achieved. Do not kill rock elementals for anything besides elementalists. During Phase2 a particularly dangerous NPC will spawn called the "Firecallers". These casters will aoe your party, heal enemy NPCs, and will spawn continuously during Phase2. Firecallers are the #1 kill priority. All players should endeavor to interrupt their healing move called "Cauterizing Wound". The off-tank should taunt all Security Guards that spawn in waves and fight them near the entrance. This is to keep the guard's shield areas away from NPCs that need killing. Though keep in mind that elementalists aren't affected by this shield area, rocks are however. Guards don't deal much damage so the off-tank isn't in any real danger. DPS and main tank will systematically move around the room, pulling rocks to remove the damage immunity, and killing elementalists. I recommend starting on the right side and moving around clockwise. Melee be careful on the last elementalist on the left side, there is unmarked fire there. Only attack that elementalist from the upper left side, near the furnace itself - that is the only safe spot (marked on image). The Furnace will continue to blast out waves of heat at regular intervals. Healers should ensure they have reserves of mana near the end of Phase2, because Phase3 is fast moving and stressful. Being out of mana will be the end of the party, so be prepared. When the last elementalist dies, the boss will be released and Phase3 begins. Phase3: Kill the Boss The trapped elemental is now free and the last battle of Furnace begins! The boss is the elemental that was captive and powering the furnace of BRF, you have been slowly setting it free so you can kill it right now. This is a hectic phase of the battle and can either be the easiest phase or the hardest. No players should have died in Phase1 or Phase2; if this is the case then the boss will die quickly. "Melt" is the danger in Phase3. It is a debuff similar to "Rupture" which will drop lava under the feet of the targeted player. All players affected by Melt should run to the edges of the room, away from the rest of the party (generally back into the original corner, never where the party will be moving). Melt will burn anyone within its boundary and is dangerous. All players must keep the party safe from Melt, and the tanks must position the boss so Melt doesn't kill their comrades. When Phase3 begins do the following: * Tanks will taunt the boss into the back corner and begin fighting there * Heroism / Bloodlust should be used * All DPS immediately kill any remaining guards or Firecallers * Ignore the Rock Elementals, they don't matter Once the remaining NPCs are dead, begin cleaving down the boss unleashing all of your cooldowns. Hold nothing back. Watch for the Melt debuff and keep your comrades safe. Do not stand in fire. Try using the "Mecha-Blast Rockets" since they cut through armor and hit the boss with a DoT. When in doubt, use defensive CDs and ensure your survival. Healers will be under heavy stress as the raid will be taking near-constant damage. The only way to win is for that boss to die before the party dies, so unleash hell upon it!! Tanks should endeavor to move in a slow and deliberate manner. Positioning the boss around the room carefully, moving from back left corner to the back right side corner. Move too slow and the party will get burned by lava and die. Move too fast and there will be nowhere left to stand once you reach the other corner. Keep your cool, maintain threat and slow+steady movement toward the other side of the room. When the boss dies, the battle for the Furnace is over! Tips and Tricks * In Phase1, Priests can use "Mind Control" on the Engineers to cause them to cast the bomb spell more quickly * Shaman have "Glyph of Healing Stream Totem" which grants a 10% fire damage reduction to affected players (almost all damage in Furnace is fire damage) * Death Knights' Grip ability is useful in pulling rocks near elementalists * Furnace is a single target battle, regardless of how it looks * In Phase1, killing an engineer right by the hatch will enable closing the hatch in a single bomb bag duration The Bosses of BRF # Beastlord Darmac (entrance --> right turn --> in the hallway) # Operator Thogar (entrance --> right turn --> through hallway) # Iron Maidens (jump down into the water from Thogar) # Hans'gar and Franzok (entrance --> left turn --> down elevator) # Flamebender Ka'graz (follow path past Hans/Franz) # Kromog (in a chamber near Flamebender) # Oregorger (entrance --> right down past the rocks --> left at the fork) # Gruul (entrance --> right down past the rocks --> right at the fork) # The Blast Furnace (entrance --> right turn and keep going down past the rocks) # Blackhand (entrance --> straight forward --> up elevator)